He’s also a suspect for a series of sexual assaults in southern Sydney in the mid 1980s.

In 1988, Coulston was in the national spotlight with an unsuccessful exploit to sail a homemade 2.4m boat G’Day 88 to New Zealand. He was rescued after 45 days at sea.

His next media outing would be for the Burwood murders.

In sentencing, the judge declined to fix a parole period, saying: "You have forfeited forever your entitlement to live outside the confines of a prison".

Roger Rogerson

Roger Rogerson relished the title ‘disgraced detective’, once quipping he’d change his unimaginative name to it by deed poll.

The humour stopped in May 2014 when he was arrested, along with sidekick and former detective Glen McNamara, for the murder of 20-year-old wannabe drug kingpin and Triad-connected Jamie Gao.

A 2016 photo of Roger Rogerson being escorted to a prison van at the Supreme Court in Sydney. FileImage: Dean Lewins/AAP

In Gao, the pair of homicidal retirees saw a fast top-up to their meagre superannuation.

They had arranged to buy nearly three kilograms of ice from him.

When Gao arrived at their meeting in Padstow with the drugs, he was expecting a fat wad of cash in return.

Instead, the two ex-detectives brought a gun.

Most of the murder and their clumsy attempt to dispose of the late Mr Gao was recorded on CCTV.

Most of Jamie Gao's murder was caught on CCTV.Image: Supplied

One pivotal piece of footage that stunned the jury was of the pair in a lift, with Rogerson carrying a six-pack of beer to sip after a hard day’s crime.

Cold blooded and remorseless, Gao wasn’t Rogerson’s first killing.

He bragged he’d shot armed robbers Lawrence ‘Butchy’ Byrne and Phillip Western and drug dealer Warren Lanfranchi – all in the line of duty.

McNamara alleged that, over a few beers in his Padstow Heights man cave, Rogerson claimed responsibility for the death of drug dealers Alan Williams, Luton Chu and whistle-blower Sallie Anne-Huckstepp.

A media scrum greeted former Police officer Roger Rogerson as he was taken into custody in 2014.Image: AAP Image/Dan Himbrechts

Not long before his arrest for the Gao murder, the elderly Rogerson was allegedly marketing himself unsuccessfully as a hitman.

Rogerson, now aged 78, was sentenced to life.

He denied his guilt throughout the Gao trial, declaring he was only offering McNamara ‘grandfatherly advice’.

Arthur ‘Neddy’ Smith

Like his onetime partner in crime Roger Rogerson, Smith is a remorseless killer motivated only by self-interest.

He killed with the same ease as ordering a beer and, like Rogerson, will probably die in prison.